


tied to the shifting ground

by lisettedelapin



Category: Free!
Genre: Epistolary, Friendship, Gen, Gen Work, Leaving Home, Long-Distance Friendship, Post-Series, Swimming, and other stuff too, could be interpreted as romantic or pre-slash though, it's free! go nuts!!, mixed in with prose
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-05
Updated: 2015-11-05
Packaged: 2018-04-30 03:31:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,346
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5148686
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lisettedelapin/pseuds/lisettedelapin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Because that’s what we’re working towards and that’s where we’ll meet.” Rin's cheeks are pink with the self-awareness he seems to get caught by sometimes, like he's only just noticed the thrum of his own pulse. Still, he is adamant in holding their eyes.</p><p> <i>For the future.</i></p><p>Makoto’s breath catches. He remembers the words written in Haruka’s hand.</p><p>(in the course of a year, they learn to give measures of themselves despite the distance. there are keepsakes along the way.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	tied to the shifting ground

**Author's Note:**

  * For [WhyTheHandbasket](https://archiveofourown.org/users/WhyTheHandbasket/gifts).



> this ended up so so so much longer and more sentimental than i thought it would be. 
> 
> happy makoto birthday to WhyTheHandbasket and thank you for giving me such free reign over your gift, i really hope you enjoy it!! c:
> 
> title from [clearest blue](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QpFXXPruuqU) by chvrches!

It is almost March, too early for the cherry blossoms to wake, when for the second time Makoto and Haruka find themselves preparing for Rin to leave.

It’s not exactly a conscious process so much as it is a natural adaption of sorts. Rin shoots into their lives, shakes light and shadow into hyper-focus like a meteor shower, and then disappears in as much a flurry as he’d came. Those who love him are left with none of his flare, but instead embers to reflect on. They won’t fade, nothing Rin touches could truly fade -- but it’s always like the sun has shifted, dimmed slightly. Their eyes have to grow keen again to find beauty in the blight, worth in risk.

And the second time around, so much is the same. But other things, other things are different.

Rin is standing in front of them. He's in the middle, a carry bag slung over his shoulder, a suitcase far smaller than one might expect from him at his side. They’re at the foot of the shrine steps. And it’s here, with the cracked stone reaching above them, with the dignified arch of the grey torii watching, as constant as ever, that Makoto realises this will be one of the final moments he will recall Iwatobi being the home he has always known.

This sleepy town has barely shivered, the early settling of the night, the narrow streets and the houses familiarly crowded are much the same. It’s easy to feel that he is still just a boy; the same fears and the same hopes, just contained more carefully than before.

“God, this is some kind of deja vu, huh?” Rin says, one hand pressed to the back of his elegant neck, his mouth curved in a smile that seems wayward, unsure of which emotion to catch.

And he’s right, there’s a lot that’s familiar to Makoto but--

“It isn’t the same,” says Haruka, quietly.

\-- _it’s not._

Rin’s eyebrows knit, his smile faltering and Makoto thinks that right now, all three of them are hoping for one thing.

“No,” Rin says. “It won’t be.”

There’s silence then, that Makoto desperately wants to fill. But he feels he should be curating his words and now each of them feel inadequate.

He misses his moment, time steals his words and Haruka speaks instead.

“You still need to see your grandmother. You might miss your train if you don’t start now.”

Rin nods, his throat working as he swallows thickly. Makoto remembers him as a sixth grader, first to cry. Now, there are no tears; his eyes are earnest when he looks at them.

“Before I have to go uh--I--“ he purses his lips suddenly, the hand at his neck moves skittishly down to dig into his pocket. “I got you each something.”

He glares suddenly at Haruka. But there’s no real threat, his hand is clenched around whatever he’s about to give them. “Haru, don’t say anything weird. I’ll take it right back if you do.”

Before Haruka has the chance to quip back at him, Rin has already stepped forward. He uncurls his fingers, and the light catches the length of what looks like silver thread along his palm.

“I know neither of you are really into accessories but it’s small so…” He trails off and Makoto realises he’s holding two necklaces.

Rin’s rocks on his feet when he hands them over. And if it was difficult before, Makoto finds he is even more struck for words now. His chest is tight as his fingers catch the chain; he holds it up and realises that there’s something in English inscribed across the rectangular pendant.

 _For_ , he reads just as Haruka looks up from his own hand.

“The?”

Rin's eyes are shy but when he looks at them he's grinning now, equal parts nervous and bright, he’s like a flickering flame. He nods first to Makoto and then to Haruka with each word. “For--the--“ He pauses now to run a finger down the chain that’s always around his neck, and sure enough there’s a second pendant.

“Future.” The last word is said quietly, like he’s only letting it peek out from the safety of his heart. “Because that’s what we’re working towards and that’s where we’ll meet.” Rin's cheeks are pink with the self-awareness he seems to get caught by sometimes, like he's only just noticed the thrum of his own pulse. Still, he is adamant in holding their eyes.

_For the future._

Makoto’s breath catches. He remembers the words written in Haruka’s hand.  _For the team. For the future._ Makoto forgets which comes first, now there's only a blurring of the sentiment.

Haruka heaves a sigh. “People will ask questions about why mine only says ‘the.’”

But there’s the slightest of smiles twitching at his lips, he’s slipping the chain over his head without a second of hesitance, the pendant falling neatly against his chest.

Rin’s grin grows more assured; he’s better than he gives himself credit for when it comes to reading Haruka’s words.

“It’s not meant for other people. Screw ‘em.”

Haruka turns his head at that, and Makoto knows for a fact that it is to hide a proper smile of his own.

“You haven’t said a word,” Rin says, addressing Makoto now. He’s shy again and it’s not for the first time that Makoto wonders how someone can be so expressive, feeling things in such a tangled manner.

His fingers close tighter around the chain.

“I think it’s just as romantic as we’d expect from you, Rin.”

He can’t help but laugh when Rin flushes bright red. And the air is light despite the bittersweet ache in his chest. This gentle teasing comes easy, it’s rooted in history; well deserved after growing pains, bruised hearts, slow healing. And now change, for the first time, deliberated over.

This time, he and Haruka are leaving Rin as well.

And there’s so much promise in the future, for all three of them. He thinks that perhaps the reason why they can’t bring themselves to voice gratitude now is because they each know they’re not yet done being thankful.

Makoto has only ever had to understand sea change in the literal sense. But it’s more to him now, and it comes sweeping the three of them with it. They’ll have to keep their sights set high, steady.

He puts the necklace on, tucks it under his shirt and feels both past and future burn cool against his skin.

~

The first time Haruka is in Makoto’s Tokyo apartment, after hours of transit spent together and miles from their feet to their hometown, Makoto feels like the seconds ticking between them have grown fragile, somehow.

It’s not the city that’s the biggest change.

He remembers being a child, timing his mornings so that once he was out the front door, Haruka would be standing where Makoto’s house met the shrine steps. Unbidden, he smiles.

“What is it?” Haruka asks. He always seems to be watching when Makoto thinks he’s not.

“I just remembered something,” he says, and his heart steadies when he looks at Haruka. It always does, but now there’s a distinct sort of missing he’s never felt hiding in the slow drawing of his breath.

It’s bizarre, but somehow exactly like them, to be sitting and drinking tea together while on the brink of learning distance like they’ve never known. _Only a train ride away._

Haruka hums, sips at his tea. He doesn’t say anything but he’s looking expectantly at Makoto.

“Before you started your morning soaks, I used to make sure I was outside my house just in time for you to be at the steps.” Makoto is oddly shy for a moment, the words feel loaded as they leave him.

He and Haruka have learned to interpret one another over the years. He wonders now, what Haruka is drawing from this admission.

Haruka blinks, sets his cup down. “Me too.” He regards Makoto in that quietly perceptive way of his before he continues. “I used to time my getting to the steps for you to be outside at the same moment.”

Makoto’s not sure why but he can’t help but laugh, the slow glow of fondness tiding over his chest. And in its wake he realises that the prospect of leaving each other, no matter how much he knows they’re not really _leaving_ each other -- it will be tougher than he tells himself. He’s frightened, even though reason says he shouldn’t be.

Makoto knows he is scared of many things. But he also knows that for each time he has felt fear, he's lived through it.

And that has to mean he is learning, slowly, to be brave.

“Twenty minutes,” Haruka says.

Makoto nods, smiles as he always has at Haruka. “Not far at all.”

And when the teacups are empty, rinsed clean and stowed into the draws of Makoto’s new kitchen, when Haruka has left, Makoto breathes in the quiet and tells himself it is something he’ll get used to.

He’ll ring home in half an hour, message Nagisa and Rei to tell them how the move has gone.

He’s trying to prepare the first words he’ll say when he glances at the fridge and halts.

There’s a haphazardly torn piece of paper stuck to the door by a dolphin magnet. Haruka’s address is scrawled across it. Makoto hadn’t realised he’d forgotten to ask.

He looks at that dolphin magnet for a long time, and when a smile touches the corners of his lips, he realises the quiet is no longer clamouring inside of him.

~

 **Makoto** _invited_ **Haru** , **Rin** _to the group._

 

 

 

> **Makoto:**  
>  I thought it might be good for us to talk on here! Rin, let us know how Australia is! ^^
> 
> **Rin:**  
>  LATER tell me how Tokyo is first? what’s your address??
> 
> **Rin:**  
>  Oi Haru has LINE?
> 
> **Haru:**  
>  no.
> 
> **Rin:**  
>  I CAN’T BELIEVE YOU NEVER ADDED ME
> 
> **Makoto:**  
>  Ahhh, Nagisa finally made him download the app! It was only this week Rin
> 
> **Haru:**  
>  troublesome…
> 
> **Makoto _:_**  
>  Haru…
> 
> **Rin:**  
>  WHO ARE YOU CALLING TROUBLESOME
> 
> **Haru** _has sent an image_

Makoto downloads the image to find a photo of Haruka’s sock clad foot in the air. A somewhat menacing Northern Stoplight Loosejaw-kun turns his eyes towards Haruka’s toes.

He hadn't known what to expect but somehow he feels like he’s less surprised than he ought to be. He chuckles. He misses them both more than he feels courageous enough to say.

~

Tokyo is _big._

That’s the first thing that strikes Makoto in his initial days there, whenever he wakes up in his tiny apartment. He misses that even when by himself, he rarely felt alone in Iwatobi. He’d learned the streets like friends, tuned himself to the town’s flow.

But Tokyo, he couldn’t so much as guess the rhythm of Tokyo. If he wanders like he might’ve back in Iwatobi, he worries he’ll never find his way back. He’s miniscule here. It’s both terribly lonely and an unexpected source of excitement.

He learns to love commute. It’s rare for him to see faces he knows, and so for the course of a train ride, he can be less aware of himself. He doesn’t tire of the evenings either. Whether he’s crowded in the blink of city lights or he can see Tokyo Tower trying to pierce the sky (he tells himself that this is a novelty that will never wear off), or when he’s returning to the stillness of the tucked away street where his apartment lies; he always finds something to wonder at. He’d expected constant noise when he moved here but away from the bustle and great stretching buildings, there are pockets of quiet.

Initially, with Haruka away from him, and both of them too busy with training and university to see each other as frequently as they’d like, he feels more lost than anything else. But slowly, he comes to know the best food stalls in his area, the hidden used book stores, begins to track where he is by the brightly coloured blooms of lively alleyway flowershops . And again, it’s liberating in a sense, but even in knowing fragments of Tokyo, he is reminded of how much he hasn’t charted. He feels he could reach as far as he could but this city would still keep stacking above him. He doesn’t think it’ll ever feel wholly his.

But despite it all, it teaches him to trust his instincts; it teaches him to try. He wonders if all of this, this constant searching and stumbling and reaching is what growing up is. He can’t decide if he likes it or not.

~

 

 

 

> _Makoto,_
> 
> _I thought I’d kick off this letter writing business. It didn’t work so well the first time but it’ll be different now, yeah?_
> 
> _Australia is good. I still remember my way around Sydney! And my times seem to be improving bit by bit. Tell Haru he’d better watch out. Seriously, I’m gonna kick his ass next time we race._
> 
> _Everyone on my team is an idiot though. They’re always trying to find an excuse to go out for beer. Beers. Or…bevvies...with the boys._
> 
> _I might not be as good with alcohol as I thought I’d be. Don't tell anyone that! I’m only telling you because you’re you!_
> 
> _I think I’ve got a lot more I could say but it’s hard to figure it all out right now._
> 
> _How is Tokyo? How is your apartment? How are your classes and your friends and Haru? How are you?_
> 
> _Write back, okay._
> 
> _Yours,  
>  Rin_
> 
> _P.S. Please destroy Haru’s Loosey-kun socks. Save yourself._
> 
> _P.P.S. Is it only me that Nagisa keeps sending all these weird national geographic videos to?_

Makoto smiles for the whole day without any discernible reason.

~

He sees that Haruka is growing in his own right, learning that words are more important than he has given them credit for, how to communicate his feelings without Makoto as an interpreter. Slowly, he talks about each of his teammates on the swim team, never introducing them formally but rather trailing their names through passing statements, like Makoto already knows them. Makoto pieces together who is who; does just as much to encourage Haruka to let them befriend him as he does to afford quiet, guileless company when Haruka needs it.

The ramen shop they end up frequenting is a place they suggest to each other at the same time. It stands around the halfway mark of the train ride to each other and so they’ve both seen it countless times.

More and more often, Haruka is the one to suggest they go. Curt as his messages always are, it’s an effort nonetheless.

They manage to carve rituals for themselves here as well. And in this way, Makoto and Haruka fit themselves into each other’s lives, into the workings of this city.

There’s a kind of home in that.

~

It is April and Makoto smooths down rumpled cherry blossom petals on a scrap piece of paper.

 

 

 

> _Rin,_
> 
> _Is underage drinking risky there? Be careful and make sure you’re with people you trust!_
> 
> _It’s great to hear from you -- really great. Thank you for writing. I’m happy to hear about your swim times! But you’re forgetting that Haru’s been training as well. There’s no way he’ll go down easy!_
> 
> _Is your team friendly? All of the members of Haru’s team seem to have taken to him. I’ve met them a few times -- they’re all very kind. I hope yours are the same. Say, have they given you a nickname there? I heard that everything gets a nickname in Australia. But you can’t really shorten Rin, can you?_
> 
> _Tokyo is confusing, but good overall. I think I’m finding it better everyday. I’m really enjoying my classes. But no matter what, I can never say "Early Childhood Pedagogy'" right on the first go. That aside, it's a really interesting course along with my other subjects! The people in my classes are surprisingly friendly, actually._
> 
> _How about you? Are you balancing study and swimming okay? Haru is exhausted most of the time -- training seems pretty rigorous. So I hope you’re taking care over there. Write back when you can!_
> 
> _Yours,  
>  Makoto_

  
“Haru?”

Haruka hums in response from his place on the sofa, he’s poring over a piece of paper on the coffee table.

“Has Nagisa been sending you weird National Geographic videos?”

Haruka pauses, looks up, the slightest crease between his brows. “No?”

Makoto shakes his head, smiling. “Rin says Nagisa’s been sending him weird National Geographic videos.”

One side of Haruka’s mouth quirks. When he meets Makoto’s eyes he breathes out the Haruka version of a laugh at the same time that Makoto lets slip a quiet chuckle.

 

 

 

> _  
> P.S. Nagisa isn’t sending anyone else weird National Geographic videos. What kind of videos? Do I want to know?_
> 
> _P.P.S. I’m passing on your address to Haru. I think he’d like to send you things too.  
>    
>  _

~

He comes home one day to find the softest pair of socks he’s ever touched atop his shoe rack. They’ve got ears…whiskers.

Haruka bought him cat socks.

Makoto laughs. Sends a message through his phone to thank Haruka.

He grins every time he looks down at his feet.

~

 

 

 

> _Makoto,_
> 
> _Relax, legal age here is 18. And it seems like people start way younger anyway. Whatever, I don't think I really want to drink like that again. The morning after was so crappy and I have swimming to think about so it's not a convenient thing to do._
> 
> _Did you press the sakura yourself? I can picture them on the trees so easily now. Still wish I could be there to see them in person with you and Haru._
> 
> _Have you swam at all lately?_
> 
> _Yours,  
>  Rin_
> 
> _P.S. Videos about sharks…so many sharks… What if the internet providers look at my activity? Surfers keep getting eaten here._
> 
> _P.P.S They call me Ritz…don’t ask._
> 
> _P.P.P.S. WHAT DO ALL THESE ROCKS MEAN? HARU WON’T GIVE ANY EXPLANATION WHY IS HE LIKE THIS?_

~

Every attempt at a letter and he can only manage to say that yes, he did press the flowers himself.

He wonders why it’s so frightening to admit that he wishes Rin were here too.

And as for swimming, he can’t so much as touch upon that. His hand seizes in the way his throat might lock up every time he tries to answer. He’s got a notebook of lecture notes on it, plans to get in the pool eventually, at least.

But the answer is no. He hasn’t actually been swimming. And he keeps stopping himself from dwelling long enough to articulate just why that is.

~

June sends warm rain pattering against the windows. He and Haruka tend to welcome the noise, quieting sometimes just to listen to the steady percussion of it. Now, they’re doing just that until Haruka interrupts.

“Makoto?”

“Hm?”

“You’re not swimming anymore.”

They’re lying side by side on a futon in Haruka’s apartment, just like they used to when they were kids. Makoto’s breath stutters, caught off guard by Haruka.

He’d expected him to notice. He hadn’t expected him to say anything.

“Not of late, no.”

“I wanted to ask you--“ Haruka pauses. Makoto hears him exhale softly.

“Were you trying to find something that day we raced?”

Makoto feels his heart clench at the memory. “Maybe.” He smiles and says the next words like they’re nothing. “I think I just realised I didn’t have it in me to find in the first place.”

“Why not backstroke?”

“Because Haru only swim free.”

Haruka is silent for a long time. And then, even as ever: “but you were never swimming just for me.”

~

“Rin’s asking why you haven’t responded to his last letter.”

Makoto’s throat runs dry. He chooses that moment to sort out his recycling.

~

For almost a month, there’s a standstill of sorts in their communication. University gets hectic as exams approach and Makoto doesn’t write back. Rin doesn’t send another letter.

Haruka’s swim team starts doubling the amount of training each week, it’s not rare for him to crash as soon as he gets home .

Stress starts to feel like part of Makoto's routine. Missing his family becomes an ever-present ache, it’s buried well enough to leave it be, still sharp enough to be felt. His interactions with others narrow to conversation with classmates between lectures, plans made that never quite come to fruition, polite smiles and shared notes.

He and Haruka still message, of course. But they seem to communicate primarily in reminders (" _makoto, remember to eat dinner"_  and " _take your glasses off before you sleep"_ ). Like that, Makoto worries they might lose some of each other. He doesn’t want to express that concern; he knows Haruka is busy.

He wonders about Rin often enough for guilt to weigh every prospective word he might give.

The chain still hangs around his neck. He wonders if maybe this is just how it’s supposed to go.

~

 

 

 

 

> **Rin:**  
>  Oi guys
> 
> **Haru:**  
>  i forgot about this chat
> 
> **Rin:**  
>  Exactly
> 
> **Rin:**  
>  I think we should skype or something
> 
> **Rin:**  
>  Guys?
> 
> **Rin:  
>  ** Hey??
> 
> **Rin:**  
>  Seriously it’s been ages, I’m trying here
> 
> **Haru:**  
>  we can skype
> 
> **Makoto:**  
>  I’d really like that, Rin

~

“Nice socks,” teases Rin, from the laptop screen as Makoto makes his way back from Haruka’s kitchen. He sets down two cups of tea on the desk and smiles when he looks at Rin’s lopsided grin.

For a moment, it’s easy.

“Haru found them. They’re a lot less intimidating than Loosey-kun, that’s for sure.”

Haruka sniffs from his spot next to Makoto. “Both of you have bad taste.”

Makoto laughs at the same time that Rin lets out a derisive snort.

“Haru, that fish is legitimately horrifying, its eyes are soulless,” Rin says.

“Loosey-kun is a hero.”

“Alright, but an ugly one.”

“He has character.”

Rin raises an eyebrow, and before he can say something that really stirs Haruka up, Makoto interjects.

“As much as I agree that Loosey-kun is an important topic…I think we’ve got some catching up to do first?”

And in an instant, a month of silence makes its presence known. Makoto wonders if he should be the one to continue speaking.

Instead, Rin heaves a sigh before disrupting the quiet. “Yeah, it’s been a while.”

Makoto bites his lip, familiar guilt hollowing the pit of his stomach.

“I’m sorry for that,” he says, softly.

Rin looks up, eyes wide, before shaking his head firmly. “Not your fault.” One side of his mouth pulls up in a smile. “Things got busy for all of us by the looks of it. Anyway, how have you both been?”

It’s like the lilt of a familiar song, the way they ease back into who they have always been with each other. And it’s as he is speaking that Makoto realises it’s been a while since he last heard the sound of his own voice flow so freely. It feels good to speak without measuring his thoughts.

Training schedules are compared, classes discussed, the origin of “Ritz” deftly sidestepped. They talk about the collection of rocks displayed proudly by a sheet of torn paper covered in clumsily pressed flowers behind Rin. Haruka questions why one rock is missing, and then there’s the sight of a blush blooming across Rin’s cheeks as he begrudgingly pulls another stone from the pocket of his jacket. It’s a simple looking thing, but when Makoto squints he can just make out lines of blue shining across it like a river. He hopes that from Rin’s side, it’s visible how Haruka softens even as he teases Rin’s show of sentimentality.

They talk about teammates, students, Ren and Ran, Gou, about Sousuke, Nagisa and Rei.

Really, Makoto should see it coming as soon as their words seem to overflow into contented silence.

Rin says his name, softly.

Haruka yawns, slouches to rest his chin atop his folded forearms and blinks lazily up at Rin’s image on the screen. Makoto makes a faint noise of acknowledgement from his throat, nods with a smile.

“You been swimming lately?”

The reaction is immediate. Makoto feels the rows of his teeth press tight against each other. He’s heard this question too often of late.

He wants to say “no”, with some stubbornness, with a petulance he never allows himself.

Haruka speaks instead.

“He hasn’t.”

Rin looks confused. “Why not?”

“I just haven’t felt like it.”

Rin frowns now. “Haven't felt like it?”

Makoto knows Haruka is watching him, is resolute in not turning to meet his gaze.

And his throat is still too dry when he next speaks, he feels like his voice is rubbing him raw when it escapes. “Rin, it’s not meant for me the way it is for you." 

“What do you mean it's not meant for you?”

Makoto can see by the way Rin's eyes have narrowed that he has made a mistake in choosing this particular statement. Usually, he's better at framing things than this. He tries to square his shoulders, hopes he can find the right thing to say before this boils to conflict.

"It doesn’t have to be pro to be classified as swimming, Rin. It’s not like I won't be doing it at all. I want to coach, after all.”

"Wait--" The crease between Rin’s brow only deepens. "I’m not talking about going pro. I get it, I get that you truly want what you’re aiming for now. And it’s a good thing, it’s important. But you're not even swimming for fun anymore?” He huffs, looks Makoto dead-on.

“Is there more to this?”

Makoto recoils at that, frowning. Rin’s tone sets him on edge, he can’t help but cross his arms in defense.

Haruka is sitting up now. Makoto barely registers him saying Rin’s name in warning.

“What’s the point?” Makoto asks.

He regrets the words as soon as they’re out. He lifts the cup in front of him with both hands to stop his fingers from shaking, takes a sip of tea as an excuse to look away from Rin. He’s left it to steep for too long.

“You don’t mean that…”

“Rin--“

“Makoto, you’re good,” comes Haruka’s voice, even again.

Rin is nodding. “Exactly. _Exactly._ And I know you don’t want to go pro, but fuck, you could’ve -- still _could_. So this better not be out of some screwed up idea that you’re…not good enough somehow?”

He knows he’s a good swimmer.

But he’s not a natural like Haruka.

And perhaps he’s good enough to try for pro like Rin says. But it’s not a world meant for him.

He doesn’t thirst like Rin.

“I don’t want to talk about this.”

He thinks about Rin and Haruka. Even when looking for it, he doesn’t find so much as a trace of envy. Maybe he’s beginning to understand. It’s not how good a swimmer he is that stops him so much as it is what it means, now, to be swimming alone. And maybe it’s not so much what it means to be swimming alone than it is the exact presences he will not be fit to cross.

And there’s that hazy sort of missing again.

Rin looks like he wants to say more, but Makoto manages to seek his eyes on the screen. He watches Rin huff out a resigned breath, his shoulders sagging.

“I won’t press,” he says.

Makoto hates how disappointed Rin sounds. He hates even more that he feels a forlorn tug at his chest at the words.

“It’s late,” Haruka says.

“Yeah, I’ll talk to you guys later. Take care.”

Rin lingers a moment longer than he needs to on Makoto, before ending the call.

~

 

 

 

> **Rin:**  
>  Makoto, I’m sorry for earlier
> 
> **Makoto:**  
>  It’s okay. There’s no need to apologise
> 
> **Rin:**  
>  I won’t take it back though
> 
> **Rin:**  
>  But I’m still sorry
> 
> **Makoto:**  
>  Rin, it’s fine
> 
> **Rin:**  
>  Nah, I didn’t handle it right
> 
> **Rin:**  
>  But help me understand so I can??

Makoto kicks his blanket half-off -- it’s been getting warmer these days -- and considers his phone for a very long while. He backspaces three messages, rearranges words only to remove them.

 

 

 

> **Makoto:**  
>  What do you think I'd swim for?
> 
> **Rin:**  
>  It’s swimming, isn’t that reason enough? For yourself??
> 
> **Rin:**  
>  For the bonds too. But first, for yourself. It goes hand in hand in some ways. You know that.

~

Mid-July brings the swelter. The air seems thick most days, sticking against the back of Makoto’s neck like a heated second skin.

He starts to take the long way to some of his classes, passing the pool in the process.

The cool, constant blue of the water starts to look like freedom. And Makoto smiles to himself because that thought sounds like it’d belong to Haruka.

~

“It’s fuckin’ _cold_ ,” Rin grumbles. He’s got a blanket tucked under his chin and his nose is pink, his teeth chattering now and then. Australian weather is apparently not all sun and smiles.

Meanwhile, Haruka spreads his bare arms over the desk in an attempt to cool himself down. Makoto tries to edge closer to the direction of the air blasting from the portable fan sat behind the laptop.

Rin makes a strangled noise suddenly and Makoto and Haruka both jump at the same time.

“ _Shitshitshitshitshit_.”

“What happened?” Makoto asks, eyes wide.

Rin appears the pinnacle of despair. “Foot slipped out the blanket. I want to die.”

Makoto turns his eyes to the ceiling, shaking his head. He wonders, not for the first time, if Rin had in a previous life maintained a successful career in theatre.

Haruka settles back down, his cheek pressed to the laminate so that in the tiny box on the skype screen he looks more like a hairball with arms than a person.

“If it’s cold you should swim more,” he says to Rin, or possibly to the desk. “It won’t be too warm or too cold in the water.”

“Haru…” Makoto laughs around his name with an exasperated sort of fondness. He won’t admit it but he makes a convincing argument. The pool doesn’t sound like a bad place to be right now.

~

August comes with deliberateness. Haruka’s first tournament is scheduled this month and so he and Makoto keep track of its arrival. As a result, July never gets the days swept out from under it.

The morning of the tournament, Makoto takes his and Haruka’s twenty minute train, imagines himself travelling through a wire as he listens to the wheels rumble against the tracks. He walks ten minutes through meandering streets, past a hole-in-the-wall izakaya and a park with a pond, and then under telephone wires as he follows the length of mottled concrete bricks, past tall buildings of compact units and bike racks, until he finds the old gate of Haruka’s apartment building.

He jogs up three flights of stairs, uncovers Haruka’s spare key and half opens, half shoulders his way through the door. He checks his watch, they’ll be late if they don’t leave in the next fifteen minutes. It’s still early in the morning and part of Makoto just wants to crash on Haruka’s yet to be rolled futon but he resists and moves for the bathroom instead.

Sure enough Haruka’s got his jammers on and his eyes are closed in complete tranquility; like being in the water might as well be sleeping.

Makoto manages to draw him out with a mention of the time and an outstretched hand and then they’re both out the door within ten minutes. He notices that Haruka seems sharper than usual, devoting more concentration to every small task he undertakes.

It’s with some surprise that Makoto realises he’s nervous.

“You’re going to be great, Haru.”

Haruka looks up at Makoto, his eyes softening almost imperceptibly. _Almost._ To one who knows him, these traces and shifts are opaque. He nods once.

It’s odd for Haruka to be nervous but Makoto can’t help but be happy about it. Nerves don’t exist without hope and if Haruka is hoping for something, Makoto will hope too.

~

“He was _amazing!_ He was on the starting block and then the pistol went off and he was like a blur in the water; I’d never seen him as fast--“

“The _video._ Makoto, send me the video already come on!”

Makoto laughs sheepishly, raising one hand to scratch at the back of his neck. He hadn’t realised he was getting carried away. “Right, sorry.”

He reaches for his phone, sends the video through their LINE chat and smiles at Haruka before turning back to his laptop screen. He hears Rin’s notification, watches as he brings his phone to his face to check.

“Got it!” Rin sits up straight, eyes bright.

Haruka rests his elbow on the table and presses his knuckle to his mouth, embarrassed. “Are you planning on recounting it to everyone we know.”

Makoto turns to him, his gentle brand of stern creasing his eyebrows. “Not everyone could come out to support you in person like we normally would, Haru. It’s important to us.”

There’s a faint dusting of pink across Haruka’s cheeks then, and Makoto softens. “Nagisa was messaging me once every five minutes asking if you’d raced yet even though I’d told him exactly what time you were scheduled. I sent them the video and apparently Rei showed it to the entire team complete with an inspiring speech.” He breathes out a laugh before adding, “even Ren and Ran wouldn’t stop pestering me to tell them about it.”

Haruka’s eyes widen, he exhales slowly. “You’re all making such a big deal of it.”

“Because it _is_ a big deal,” comes Rin’s voice.

They turn back to Rin who is, sure enough, completely engrossed in the video. By now his smile has stretched to a full blown, sharp-edged grin.

“How did it feel?” Rin asks Haruka, once the video is over. He sets his phone down before he speaks again. “I mean beyond amazing, that is…”

He looks happy, shaking his head, his bright smile still in place, twinkling like he’s on the precipice of giddy laughter. Makoto feels lightweight, dizzy at the sight.

Haruka shrugs. “Good?”

“And?”

“The water was very accepting.”

Rin raises an eyebrow. Still, of all the possible answers Haruka could’ve given, this one seems perfectly fitting.

“I think the water has a bias,” Makoto says, nodding to himself.

 _Who wouldn’t?_   He thinks, and he has the feeling the sentiment is shared when onscreen, Rin catches his eye and the laughter slips from them at the same time. There’s still pink at Haruka’s cheeks and Makoto watches the fond slide of Rin’s gaze to him. For a moment, they are just three kids stumbling on their growing affections all over again.

~

It’s not just Haruka’s swimming Makoto can’t stop recalling.

He’d forgotten what it felt like to be in the stands during a race. He’d forgotten about the tension, the hope; sparking like a fraying live-wire, jolting the air awake with electricity. He’d forgotten how it made him feel to watch a person put their all into something. He could only swallow the electric air, feel it burst out of him in great, lung baring cheers when Haruka swam.

Makoto had revelled in that energy. He’d forgotten too, how it felt to want something with all his might. Generally, he is a boy focused so surely on being careful with what he has rather than taking what the world might offer. When swimming, he never had to spare a single thought about stretching his fingers to the sun on each stroke.

He’d remembered, and he’d wanted badly to be in the water then.

He’d watched how Haruka’s team interacted, the laughter and the encouragement and the absolute care; each of them wanting to win for both the team and themselves. And Makoto has friends to drag him out the apartment on weekends, people to laugh with when it feels like their lecturers might actually be brick pavers; but it’s not the same as what it was to have a team. Standing on the outskirts, Makoto had missed the give and take, the connection in having a group of people be an extension of yourself for the course of a competition.

He’d settled bittersweetly into holding to the memory from his distant place in the stands. Now, he had no reason to place his heart on a 100m line.

Haruka’s university took first place overall.

And Makoto hadn’t just watched if Haruka showed any reaction to that. He’d been too fixated on how tightly the team held each other’s hands.

~

 

 

 

> _Rin,_
> 
> _How are things? I can’t believe August’s almost over. I hope you’re well. Is it getting warmer yet? How’s swimming going? I think Haru misses competing against you but I can tell he’s putting his all into it with you in mind._
> 
> _Ah, if it is getting warmer, I wonder do you go to the beach at all? I never remembered to ask you if Bondi is as great as everyone says it is. You mentioned sharks in one of your last letters as well.…please be careful!_
> 
> _Are your teammates well? Still asking you out to drink beer?_
> 
> _Actually, I’m writing you today because I dug out this old photo. I thought it might be good for you to have it.  
>    
>  _

The photograph is from Nationals last year. It’s not the one of Iwatobi: sixth best in the entire country (he can’t help a proud smile at that; he’d captained after all). Instead, it’s a shot of Iwatobi and Rin. Rin had shied when he saw they were taking team photos, but Nagisa and Rei had drawn him in with no option for protest. It’d felt right with him there; the first team they’d ever strung together. And Makoto had wondered if any of them would be there if it weren’t for Rin.

He can’t see any gaps between them in the image. They’ve all got their arms linked around each other, holding each other steadily in place while the pool glimmers behind them.

He can smell the chlorine, remembers the salt of sweat and tears. He remembers the weight and warmth of arms, hands.

He slips the photo into the envelope with utmost care. He’d found one taken from Regionals the year before as well, but he’d felt compelled to keep it. He thinks of that moment as the one that Rin had returned to them. He remembers their first outing as a group after Regionals. Nagisa had stuck close to Rin at every moment, unconditionally affectionate. Rin had seemed unsure of how to act with him, caught in the frustrated space between guilt and gratitude.

Haruka had been holding himself back from speaking. Rin's presence had been like a dream, delicate enough to break at the trigger of a single word.

But they had all tried. It was the trying that made Makoto know it was real, that this time they would be okay.

 

 

 

> _I’m sure you remember it._
> 
> _Yours,  
>  Makoto_

~

September cuts the thick heat of the fading summer. It’s a cool morning, not exactly swimming weather, when Makoto wakes to reach for his phone. He sends a simple message to Haruka and receives possibly the fastest response in the entire history of their friendship.

They meet at a public pool not far from either of them. Haruka is there first, presumably because a pool is involved.

“It’s about time,” he says quietly, as soon as Makoto approaches him. Makoto gets the feeling he’s talking about more than just his arrival.

Makoto smiles, he’s nervous and he hopes it doesn’t show. But he knows Haruka knows him better than that.

“Makoto?”

“Hm?”

Haruka lays his palm flat against Makoto’s shoulder. “Just be.”

Makoto almost laughs. It's been a while since he was last on the receiving end of Haruka's weirdly zen, completely incomprehensible-in-all-it's-simplicity advice. Rei had labelled these sayings  _Haruisms._

This one makes sense though, he thinks.

He inhales the chlorine before he touches his fingers to the water. He dips one foot in and then he lets his entire body be enveloped for the first time in months. He looks at his ten fingers, blue where the water masks them like liquid cellophane. He looks at Haruka as the corners of his lips quirk up at Makoto, and he is barely registering the smile before Haruka dives and _oh_ , how could he have ever forgotten what happened to the water once Haruka was in it?

There’s barely anyone else here; the centre has only just opened after all. And Haruka swims the length and width of the pool like it’s an old friend.

Makoto laughs at that thought, and the water shifts around him at the motion. He’s thrown suddenly, by how much he missed this.

“Swim,” comes Haruka’s voice, from the other end of the pool.

Makoto looks at him, suddenly feeling like his legs aren’t really his. He imagines what Rin might say.

_Don’t hold back._

He sucks in a breath and purses his lips, presses his feet to the wall, his muscles revelling in the old feeling.

He knows just what to do when he pushes off, his eyes trained on the ceiling, reaching for it with his arms as he carries himself onwards, ever onwards and then he’s hitting the other wall and he’s breathless but it’s not from exertion.

It’s over too fast.

His heart is racing. Haruka has his arm on the ledge of the pool, watching when Makoto turns to him.

“Again,” Haruka says.

Makoto pushes harder this time, his kicks more rapid, his arms slicing through the water with every deliberate draw of breath from his lungs.

There's fear striking in his heart at the thought of the water, dark beneath him, but he gives it his all, reaches beyond it. It carries him further. Faster still on the next lap and then again and again until the ceiling is beginning to blur into a blanket of white light and finally, the wall hits him before he can hit it. He has to sling his arm over the pool ledge, aching all over and praying he doesn’t dissolve into the water. He feels, all at once, completely exhausted and irrefutably alive.

Haruka crosses the pool to Makoto’s side. He swims free, beautiful as ever, the water drawn to him.

“It’s been a long time since I saw you swim.”

Makoto’s running too low on breath for it to catch right now. He laughs, winded but completely unbridled.

“I missed it,” Haruka says, smiling too.

And Makoto still wants to swim with him. Makoto still wants to swim.

“So did I,” he manages.

He remembers a bed of seedlings, rising pansies the last time he saw them. Then a bee cupped in Nagisa’s palms, its rice paper wings when he set it free. He remembers Haruka’s fingers between his, Rin’s airborne smile, his arms thrown to the sky before settling behind his head. He remembers a row of bricks, a row of grounded dreams.

_I swim._

“Together?” Haruka says, already pulling himself away from the ledge. And Makoto forgets the ache of his muscles in an instant.

He remembers feeling like he was flying during a relay as a child, and again just last year. He knows that it is a feeling he wants to help other people experience. But he realises, just as surely as he knows that he doesn’t want the world stage, he still wants to swim.

~

 

 

 

> _Rin,_
> 
> _I went swimming today. This will arrive to you so much later than when it happened but I feel like I need to tell you and I keep deleting the message I’m trying to write on LINE. Sorry about that. Hopefully by the time you see this I’ll know what to say._
> 
> _Yours,  
>  Makoto_

~

 

 

 

> **Rin:**  
>  OI MAKOTO I JUST GOT YOUR LETTER
> 
> **Rin:**  
>  IT’S ABOUT GODDAMN TIME!!
> 
> **Rin:**  
>  Don’t scare us like that again OF COURSE YOU SWIM
> 
> **Haru:**  
>  he’s been going regularly now
> 
> **Haru:**  
>  finally
> 
> **Haru:**  
>  life is too short to deny swimming
> 
> **Rin:**  
>  You seem to reply extra fast whenever swimming is involved…
> 
> **Rin:**  
>  see now you’re not saying anything…
> 
> **Rin:**  
>  Oi
> 
> **Rin:**  
>  HARU
> 
> **Rin:**  
>  Hey bird mouth
> 
> **Rin:**  
>  swim
> 
> **Haru:**  
>  yes
> 
> **Rin:**  
>  SEE
> 
> **Makoto:**  
>  Guys...
> 
> **Rin:**  
>  Makoto!
> 
> **Haru:**  
>  makoto
> 
> **Makoto:**  
>  Haru I’m worried, you really shouldn’t let yourself be baited so easily…
> 
> **Makoto:**  
>  Also…I may or may not have been approached by the uni swim team captain to try out next year
> 
> **Makoto:**  
>  It was odd, actually! He reminded me a bit of the elder Mikoshiba brother.

What happens next is a barrage of notifications so fast Makoto starts to think Haruka and Rin should devote themselves to building rockets rather than a career in swimming. He shakes his head, laughing.

~

October arrives awash in reds and golds. The parks are beautiful where the trees stretch their branches in great arcs, burnished leaves falling in the breeze. When the sun is out, it peeks through the foliage to leave light dappled on the ground. Makoto likes to try and follow the path woven by the shadows, a scarf secured around his neck.

Occasionally, Haruka will join him. If they have groceries to do, they’ll go together, leave with plastic bags strung around their fingers and take a detour if they see a particularly large maple tree, a gingko with yellow leaves as bright as Nagisa.

It’s always Autumn that seems to make people reflective.

They walk past the winding rows of trees. Makoto thinks, as he sometimes does, that he wishes Rin were with them too.

He sighs without meaning to and Haruka doesn’t say anything but instead turns to Makoto. It’s a cue for him to speak.

He smiles in a way he hopes doesn’t come across as rueful, tilting his head slightly. “I wonder what Rin is doing right now.”

Haruka’s eyes widen slightly, before he seems to lose focus on Makoto. When Makoto shifts to look at where Haruka is fixated, he finds a leaf more saturated than the others, like the colour of the sun at its lowest point, before ink starts to spread across the sky. It’s fluttering downwards in a way that seems deliberate, somehow.

It touches the ground, and a soft hum falls from Haruka, his eyes back on Makoto. He looks more alert than before.

“We should talk to him soon.”

Makoto nods. This time, smiling with all the ease of the warmth spreading through him.

~

 

 

 

 

> _Makoto,_
> 
> _I forgot to thank you for the photo. Of course it’d be impossible to forget that time but you’re right, it’s a good photo to have. I wish I could see everyone again._
> 
> _Sousuke finally got to visit, at least. I told you he was planning a trip over, right? Well he made it. Like, he made it…alive…to the right place. I was so scared he was going to wind up in Antarctica. Or worse, Tasmania._
> 
> _He had to go back too soon._
> 
> _But really, any time probably would’ve felt too soon. It was worth it anyway._
> 
> _I think rehabilitation has been going really well for his shoulder. It looks like it regardless of the bad days. You know we surfed? I was shit at it; didn’t catch a single wave. But he actually managed to stand on his board, God knows how. Well nah, it’s Sousuke…I guess that’s exactly how._
> 
> _We weren’t approached by any sharks. Don’t worry._
> 
> _What are you and Haru doing these days?_
> 
> _Yours,  
>  Rin_
> 
> _P.S. Bondi is…debatable? People would probably tell you it’s overrated but whatever, it’s kind of special to me._
> 
> _P.P.S. The rocks there are nice, maybe? Well I don’t know what makes a good rock, maybe they're nice. Haru's the expert, apparently. I’m sending some for each of you.  
>    
>  _

Sure enough, Makoto shakes four pebbles into his hand. Some are smooth when he turns them over, others are coarse and pale as sand. There’s a shell in there too; almost yellow in some places, its ridges fanning only to curl inwards like the end of a seahorse’s tail.

He picks it up. It’s too small to hold to his ear but he can’t help but wish it wasn’t, even if he knows it’s not really the ocean he’d be hearing anyway. He almost expects it to smell foreign, but it doesn’t. In all honesty, it smells just like Iwatobi’s beaches.

~

Today, Rin wears a tanktop when Makoto and Haruka greet him through a skype screen.

“It’s so damn hot. Ugh, November doesn’t fuck around,” he groans, throwing his hair up in a haphazard ponytail.

The first thing Makoto thinks is that he looks tired. The second is that his hair is longer than Makoto has ever seen it before. But then he backtracks, wondering if maybe it’s just that enough time has passed for him to have forgotten what Rin’s hair looks like.

“Hey,” Makoto starts. And then he shies instantly at the prospect of the words he’s about to say.

“We’ve missed you, Rin.”

Rin blushes instantly at that, turning his face to his palm and sputtering. “Yeah, well…”

“Rin…” comes Haruka’s voice.

Makoto sees Rin peek at Haruka, without turning his head.

Haruka continues calmly. “It would be good if you were with us.”

Somehow, Rin seems to progress to a shade even more red than he already is. Makoto guesses it’s just part of his ability to make anything possible.

“Yeah, s-so I can kick your ass…” Whispered. Somewhat pathetically. Rin still can’t seem to turn back to them.

Haruka shrugs, a wry smile playing at his lips. “Sure, Rin.”

Rin drops his hand, blushing no less than before, but managing to twist around to face them. He heaves in a great breath. “Look…look, you can’t just--just spring this out of nowhere!” He groans. “Jeez, I wasn’t _prepared--_ ”

Makoto shakes his head, grinning. “Ah what do we do with you, Rin?”

“So troublesome,” Haruka adds, nodding.

And at the sight of Rin’s face, Makoto bursts, the light in his chest spilling as the sound of Haruka’s quiet laughter joins his own.

~

Haruka makes the mistake of leaving his art book on the table. Makoto feels more guilty over the fact that he doesn’t even try to curb his curiosity than he does about picking it up. The weight of the book in his hands is heavy with the knowledge that Haruka has hidden numerous thoughts within it. He reads _50 sheets -- watercolour paper_ on the back label before he turns it over, skating his fingers carefully over the edge of the pages.

He’s caught when Haruka returns, with two steaming cups of tea and a raised eyebrow.

Makoto freezes, and Haruka simply brings one cup to his mouth to take a sip.

“You can go ahead,” he says, inclining his head to the book, and Makoto exhales in a rush; feels his arms relax.

He waits until Haruka joins him, setting their cups down softly on the table before sitting next to Makoto.

Makoto looks at him, to make certain he has permission. Haruka nods and at that, he turns the first page.

Haruka doesn’t say anything while Makoto looks, and for some reason Makoto finds he can’t really formulate any clear cut thoughts anyway. He can only hum when he sees something particularly beautiful, lingering on a certain page or letting his fingers drift without touching the paper, over a detail that catches his eye.

He can’t say he really understands much of it, not in terms where he can set a specific name to a feeling, but there are pieces that tug at him more than others. It’s all beautiful though, with swirls of blue tying every work together; wisps of colour put to people and place in ways that make them seem more real than they might in person, somehow.

Haruka paints how he swims; in loose, flee flowing strokes that still translate as clean, not a drop of energy wasted; all the covert elegance of fleeting things, like a flutter of the eyelids, like exhaling.

Makoto’s breath stops when he comes across a pair of hands. He knows them, he realises, when he glances down at his own.

He knows them but they’re not as he knows them.

Haruka speaks before Makoto looks at him, his voice a shy thing amongst the steam of their tea, the chill November air.

“Rin said in passing once that you have interesting hands.”

Makoto feels heat flare at his ears, he can’t contain the surprise in his voice. “In passing?”

Haruka offers no real explanation. “He’s right.”

He looks again, at Haruka’s depiction of his thumbs, jutting in a way that seems too strong for the soft lines of his lean fingers, the freckle on his left wrist. All of this, Makoto knows. But there’s more. There’s grace in where Haruka has brushed shadow down his knuckles, in the swell of a pen callus, the strong angle of the gap between his thumb and his index finger, grounded at one point and stretching for something beyond the page at another.

“I wish I could paint yours like that,” Makoto says, his voice sounding airy to himself. He swallows thickly. He'll tuck this feeling away for now, mull on it later among other soft things. “Thank you, Haru.”

Haruka shrugs.

Makoto pinches the corner of the page now. He turns it, reluctantly, and arrives at the most striking work yet.

It’s Iwatobi, he realises, at the sight of the rising mountains, the ocean and the sky. But it’s more like if the setting sun spilled its heart across the town. There’s shades of red all over the place and Makoto thinks that if it weren’t for the hazy shape of the mountains, the sea would look like a mirrored version of the sky. He can see pine trees, coloured in a way that almost makes them look like snapdragons. There are stars, bright and sharp as lemon candies, dotting the sweeping sky, and the deep purple mountains sink to the pale blues and greens tempering the red nearing the shoreline of the ocean.

He feels like his family and friends are both closer and even further away.

“I like that one,” Haruka says.

The colours look like a fever dream but they still strike a deep, familiar chord within Makoto. He knows this Iwatobi well.

“I do too.”

~

Two things happen of note in December. Firstly: Makoto and Haruka visit a shrine.

Before they leave, passing evergreen oaks, stripped gingko and the scent of incense hanging thick in the air, Makoto drags Haruka to the omikuji station to draw fortunes.

“You know the odds are supposed to be worse here than elsewhere, right?”

Makoto feels one corner of his lips turn up in as impish a smile as he’ll ever manage. “All the more opportunity to test our luck.”

Haruka shakes his head. “I think I lost the one I drew at the start of the year.”

“Ah, regular luck, right?” Makoto laughs when he remembers Rin’s _half-luck._ He wonders if Rin still has it; that seems like the kind of thing he’d do.

“Shall we go for it?” Makoto asks.

Haruka sighs but nods his head, drawing a coin from his pocket.

They each take their turn dropping their 100 yen coins into the slot and picking up a box. Makoto closes his eyes as he listens to it rattle; he’s not superstitious, really, but he can’t help but make a wish anyway.

They pull their numbers, open their respective drawers and take a paper slip each.

Makoto turns back to Haruka before he reads his, only to find Haruka is doing the same. He cracks a smile at that, and when he nods they turn to their fortunes.

Haruka speaks first. “Half-Blessing,”

“…Small Blessing.”

“Which is luckier?”

“I’m not sure…” Makoto frowns, perplexed, before shaking his head, his tone brightening. “Hey Haru, we didn’t draw bad fortunes though!”

“Maybe we’re lucky today…” Haruka pauses in thought. “We should visit the fish market later.”

Makoto decides to ignore that last bit for now. “Do you think we could draw one for Rin as well? He said he won’t be able to make it back at all in January.”

“Does it still count if he’s not doing it himself?”

“It’s worth a shot. We’ll think about him and split up the steps?”

Haruka hums in assent, reaching for another coin. They repeat the process, thinking of Rin the entire time; Makoto shakes the box, Haruka checks the number, Makoto opens the respective drawer and Haruka takes the fortune. They look at each other, not yet checking the slip.

“We’ve already used all our luck, it won’t be good,” Haruka says.

Makoto shakes his head. “But if we’re supposed to be lucky, we should draw a good one.”

“That’s Nagisa logic.”

Makoto shrugs. “It works for him, doesn’t it?”

He takes Haruka’s silence as consensus.

They both look down to read the fortune.

When they read it, instantly, Makoto begins to laugh. He sees Haruka’s eyes crinkle in amusement.

“How fitting.”

~

_Future Blessing._

He mails it with no accompanying letter.

~

 Secondly: Makoto and Haruka buy two plane tickets.

~

It is almost February, too late to see the jacarandas in bloom, when for the first time in a year Makoto and Haruka find themselves next to Rin.

Tokyo is big, Makoto was right about that, but it isn’t the sort of big that could’ve prepared him for Sydney's space.

Sydney sprawls. The suburbs feel like they could be islands and the buildings are wide along the roads. The roads seem to run everywhere, sidewalks lining them in parallel borders. There are trees and parks in every direction, _gum trees_ Rin says, _crepe myrtle_ and _banksia_ and evergreens that Makoto doesn’t know how to differentiate. The air smells fresh, even in the heat, and the Harbour Bridge looms, but that too is more vast than anything else. The steel structures holding it over the water look much heavier than the image of the far-off wiry looking arch set in postcards and calendars. 

Everywhere he goes, he can see at all directions. He asks Rin how it’s not packed, and Rin only laughs, tells him Sydney _thinks_ it's more crowded than it really is.

Haruka pauses often, his eyes lingering anywhere he gets the chance despite having been here before. Makoto guesses it might be something like artist vision; he’s mapping out the underlying details that give rise to this city’s heartbeat. He also thinks it might just be that Haruka likes how blue everything is.

Now, they’re standing on the rising slope of a wide road, at the base of a flight of stairs that will take them to the Harbour bridge. Makoto has spotted cafés, a fish and chip shop, a quiet church. Rin seems completely familiar with it all, he knows this area well because it is by the North Sydney Olympic Pool.

Rin takes the steps two at a time, Makoto and Haruka behind him. When they reach the opening to the bridge walkway, Rin has already spun to face them, his eyes bright, grinning in that way that suggests the sights are no longer beyond them, but rather at their feet.

He’s right.

Makoto moves onto the bridge with his heart caught in his throat. Every step forward and the harbour seems to open to them. There’s a gap between the railing and the chain link fences, it reaches the eyeline of a child holding his mother’s hand, he doesn’t look away for even a moment. Makoto can understand why.

All three of them keep in step, leaving the silence be. It is enough for a while to take fragments of the view on their own, sharing the entire stretch of it between them at the same time.

They pause around the middle, the faintest of breezes blowing past them, like it knows something.

“ _Look,_ ” Rin says to them.

They do.

Jacarandas or not, there’s that inescapable blueness, muted in some areas and striking in others. Save for the beach, Makoto has never seen so much water in one place, glassy where the sun cuts across the blue in bright shards. But there’s softness too, whirling clouds instead of jagged light where the sky is calm against the warmth of sandstone buildings, pale grey concrete, around the sails of the Opera House pointing like five fins.

It’s beautiful, in a way that seems both natural and completely deliberate.

He can’t stop his gaze from drifting past the cityscape. Makoto can see beyond the buildings and the water, where there’s nothing but haze and tiny dots stretching into the distance. In its own way, it’s like standing at the edge of the sea.

“It just keeps going,” Haruka says.

Rin nods. He speaks now, his voice hushed as the breeze stills, warm and quiet.

“It always makes me want to reach out.”

Makoto runs a finger over his necklace.

It’s cool around his neck, he thinks, as Haruka exhales from his side. He just catches the glint of the sun on the chain before he turns to watch Rin closing his eyes, blinking them slowly open and smiling like he is seeing the harbour for the first time.

Makoto shifts again, to find exactly what Rin has just opened his eyes to. It reaches past the edges of his vision, and as he looks, he feels in a way that sweeps. But Rin is next to him. Haruka is next to him. He has a place here.

Makoto thinks of sea change, and imagines that wherever it takes them, he will have this.

On the brink of an entire world, the three of them plant their feet side-by-side.

~

Together, they look towards the impossible end of the sky.


End file.
